On 1 October this year the ABC reported that 22,000ha of the State forest was “tied up” and “in limbo” through its hosting of Gunns plantations.

The ABC reporter apparently did not record how Gunns came to convert and occupying 220 square kilometres of public forest with a mainly pulpwood crop, destined for its own use rather than for market. Economic Development Minister David O’Byrne could not say what liability the Government stood to absorb. We don’t know why FT agreed to terms which allowed a private company to tie up a government on public land, whether there were additional parties, such as MIS investors, involved, or why a corporation such as FT seemed to have no fiduciary duty of care to its public owners.

But this is only the latest in the succession of arresting anomalies that have emerged from the FT smoke since its creation.

The 2012 Forestry Tasmania figure show that 105,35ha of State Forest have been converted to plantation, with 56,010ha owned privately, 34,630 being managed by FT, and 14,710 being joint ventures of FT and private interests. What is the rationale for the public?

Perhaps most prominent of oddities is the disappearance of over 220,000ha from the State Forest since 2000, from 1.72million ha to its present 1.490,000 in its 2012 “stewardship” figures. 121,000 disappeared very quietly in the 2000-01 Annual Report to what was reported as “reclassification”. When I asked FT its fate, I was told it had gone to P&W management. When I asked P&W, they didn’t know where it was.

This was the same year as the bizarre “Land Swap”, where an alarmed Land Titles Office clerk leaked the fact that a huge land transaction was not a swap at all, but the surreptitious deeding of most of the State Forest plantation estate (already managed by FT) to FT in freehold, with no evidence that FT had surrendered or paid anything in return.

While acknowledging he had been prodded into an investigation by the AFR, the Auditor-General reported in 2004 that he was satisfied that the “swap” was in order, though he admittedly couldn’t locate the land supposedly surrendered to the Crown by FT, nor explain how FT would have possessed sufficient taxable freehold forest to pay for the 77,809ha of mainly plantation that had been given to them.

While FT claimed its freehold windfall was still State Forest, its Annual Reports showed the SF plantation estate had declined from 83,000ha in 1999/2000 to 24,000ha in the 2000-01.

Though it received little public notice, one of FT’s most audacious feats was its 2007 Heads of Agreement for Long Term Pulpwood Supply Agreement with Gunns. Although lavishly concessional to Gunns, this agreement was annotated to be consolidated with the subsequent Pulpwood Supply Agreement, and to operate independently of the pulp mill project.

The biggest jaw-dropper in the Heads of Agreement was s7:

.7 Road responsibilities and transfers.
Unless otherwise advised by FT, Gunns will be responsible for new roading within the Stumpage Zone to coupes they plan to log. In addition at such times the parties will review ownership of the existing roads associated with the new road, and effect transfers of ownership if they agree terms. This will likely see a gradual change in road ownership across the stumpage zone.

The parties agree to work together to further consider and advise, by December 2008 on a plan to rationalise road assets with a view to keeping harvesting and roading with the same entity in each of the respective supply zones.

Did anyone act on these fabulous terms?

This cavalier approach to gifting private sector friends contrasts vividly with FT’s usual fierceness in opposing environmental reserves and legislation. The Crown Lands Assessment and Classification Project (CLAC) ran from 2004-2008 deciding the disposition of 184,000 ha of unallocated Crown land to public sale or allocation to government bodies. As late as last week, the Crown Lands Department confirmed they can still not provide figures on the amount of CLAC land allocated to FT.

At least once, FT did encounter independent scrutiny, in the form of the US forestry auditor James W Sewall Co who was contracted to examine FT’s books. In their 2010 report they noted that FT had incorrectly claimed the then 1.492m ha State Forest land as a financial asset. When the $300,000,000 valuation FT assigned to it was duly subtracted, and the plantation estate valued at zero, the State Forest was deemed to be essentially worthless. But still an enormous liability to the Australian and Tasmanian public.

The following year saw newspaper reports of negotiations between FT boss Bob Gordon and the Tasmanian Aborigines, reportedly without Tas Government authority or knowledge , with the view of gifting up to 570,000ha of high conservation value State Forest to the latter, then leasing it back to FT. Mr Gordon remains in his position.

It’s easy to see why both major Tasmanian parties would prefer to see FT cop an uncontested accusation of “crass incompetence” from John Lawrence and others, rather than face a “forensic audit” of FT’s accounts.

• Crikey: Data crunch: how many (con) jobs are there in Tassie forestry?

ANDREW MACINTOSH AND RICHARD DENNISS
Climate and politics academics

According to Rene Hidding, Tasmania’s Liberal spokesman for forestry, it is “insulting” to Tasmanians to inform them about the tiny contribution the forestry and logging industries make to that state’s employment. Presumably he thinks it would be better to deceive the people?

For all of the analysis about what the collapse of the state’s forest talks means politically, there has been very little discussion about what its demise means for the Tasmanian economy. Maybe it’s because the answer is so simple; the logging industry is virtually irrelevant to the state’s economy.

According to the most recent census, less than 0.5% of the Tasmanian workforce is employed in forestry and logging (growing, maintaining and harvesting native and plantation forests). In the five years between the 2006 and 2011 census, while the Tasmanian economy created more than 12,500 new jobs, full and part-time employment in forestry and logging fell from 1447 to 975.

To put the forest industry in perspective, it is useful to compare it to the healthcare industry, which is Tasmania’s largest employer with 24,000 employees. Healthcare created around a quarter of all the new jobs in Tasmania between the latest census and the previous one. Over the same period, employment and production in the forestry industry fell by around 30%. In short, it is small and getting smaller.

If these figures take you by surprise, you’re not alone. According to a survey conducted by The Australia Institute earlier this year, on average, Tasmanians think that logging and forestry account for around 20% of all employment. They also think the forest industry accounts for 36% of the state’s exports—the reality is around 5%.

How could this be? How could the average Tasmanian confuse an industry that employs one in 200 Tasmanians with an industry that employs one in five? The most likely explanation is that after 20 years of intense conflict between the environment movement and loggers, the Tasmanian populace has confused the size of the political fight about these issues with the size of its economic significance. (The passion from both sides on conservation issues has been on display again in recent days over whether more mining should be permitted in the Tarkine region.)

The industry is always quick to point out that logging creates lots of jobs in transport and other sectors, but this is true for all industries. The tens of thousands of people employed in retail, construction, and manufacturing create far more jobs for truck drivers than the logging industry does.

And it is not only the general public that are confused about the forces at play. The federal and Tasmanian governments, and even the environment groups involved in the negotiations, have spoken about their desire to create a sustainable native forest industry, as if they are the ones that will determine its future. Undoubtedly, forest policy, particularly the subsidies the industry receives from government, does play an important part in shaping it. However, the collapse of the industry in recent years has highlighted the significance of other factors, most of which are beyond the control of government.

The mining boom has driven up the value of the Australian dollar, which has, in turn, cruelled the competitiveness of other Australian exporters, including the native forest industry. The woes of the native forest industry have been further magnified by a shift in consumer preferences away from native forest products, increasing competition from plantations, depressed wood prices, and a contraction in demand in the major woodchip market (Japan).

If the Tasmanian government is to lead a debate about the economic future of Tasmania, it must first inform the public about where Tasmania currently is and be honest about what it can and can’t control. Major factors that are shaping the forestry industry are beyond its reach: the exchange rate, international forest product prices, the state of the Japanese economy, and domestic forest policies in wood exporting countries, to name a few.

But while the Tasmanian Government cannot control either Australia’s exchange rate or world markets, it can exert influence over the kind of industries they try to attract and the kinds of investments they make in Tasmania’s workforce and its communities. Put simply, every hundred million dollars the Tasmanian government spends propping up the logging industry of the past is a hundred million they can’t invest in the new industries of the future.

The lengthy negotiations between the loggers and environment movement, even if they had been successful, have no capacity to preserve the dwindling economic significance of the native forest industry. If the state government is serious about protecting the jobs of Tasmanians today and creating jobs for Tasmanians tomorrow it should invest its time, and the public’s money, in proportion to the job-creation potential of each industry. By that measure, it should spend less than 1% of its time thinking and talking about logging.

Funny how its taking forever for Tasmania to introduce ‘unexplained wealth legislation’ into parliament?
While they are looking at ‘unexplained wealth’ they could take a peek at ‘unexplained poverty’ in the government-administered business sector. On the upside, our relationships with Sarawak and Liberia have never been stronger.

Posted by Karl Stevens on 19/11/12 at 06:58 AM

The way that FT run their books it is very near impossible to make any sense of their operations.
They don’t seem to have accounted for the 70 thousand ha of land they got under the RFA that was taken out of reserves and given to them, including the Teekoopana Plateau and Tooms Lake.
Under the RFA agreement there were supposed to be 396 thousand ha of new reserves created. Like most things in Tasmania the figures don’t add up.
6 thousand ha were new State Reserves
25 thousand Ha were Conservation Areas
30 thousand Ha were in Regional Reserves
183 thousand Ha were new forest Reserves under FT control.
This only adds up to 244 thousand ha leaving 152 thousand ha unaccounted for.
Normal for Tasmania.
What gets me is that FT have also tied up 50 odd thousand ha of public land now in the pine forests that were sold to help the piggy bank out. They sold the best money spinner they had, and have tied the land up in a deal with a private company for the next 60 years.
Doesn’t make much sense to sell the profitable bits and lose control of the land.

Posted by Pete Godfrey on 19/11/12 at 07:48 AM

The ever mysterious actions engaged in by this Forestry Tasmania GBE, with its stakeholders past, Paul Lennon, (assumed through Michael Aird the ex-State Treasurer’s role as one of the 2 stakeholders,) the other being our forestry minister Bryan Green, as the then other stakeholder, (while during the then time fall of of grace acknowledged toward Bryan Green, I understand David Llewellyn was the candidate for that period.

From hereon in we look to the workings of the Forestry Tasmania executive board and its directors which of course must have all worked in in conjunction with the aforementioned stakeholder ministers.
This interval in Tasmania’s history that saw a number of irregular major events, obviously those claimed by John Hayward, then we seek the corroborating information which should be held in the archives of F/Ts executive board meeting minutes, (if still retained as to be available for perusal by any proposed commission of inquiry,) does or should contain all of the then recorded details of who each and all were the participants then engaged in the nefarious and often controversial Forestry Tasmania doings?

Obviously this lengthy number of engagements would have carried the State forestry ministers consent, along with the then applicable State’s 2 stakeholders, and their consent?

Herein one should be able to obtain the inside information to each of the shady/shonky individual real estate type transactional dealings, also whatever distributions of Crown land were then being architected for acquisition and or disposal to be proceeded with.

The period I refer to here (so to coincide with the period of claims of John Hayward,) should become a serious cause for a detailed audit to locate the shifts in land holdings and or land acquisitions from the financial perspective, and also of the huge land volumes that were exchanged during this same period.
Currently each and all past and present persons referenced above who were engaged in the Tasmanian Forest activities during this tumultuous 10 or so years, are still standing upon the Earth,(thus not yet interred below it,) should be available to answer questions pertaining to each and all forestry dealings and or major real estate transactions?

An inquiry launched in the immediate could well reveal all the answers to the matters raised by John Hayward in his article here, so that we may finally get to the facts of each of the secretive events and the matters controversially cloaked over.
This set of revelations would be of vital moment for all Tasmanians and this State’s fine upstanding regulatory authorities.
Now who will call for this inquiry?

Posted by William Boeder on 20/11/12 at 08:24 AM

An era of the ‘lawbreakers making the rules’ necessitates an unexplained wealth inquiry. This may shed some light on the methods of land transfers and why some of our pollies and ex pollies live in the style they do. Not forgetting some captains of industry as well. The well worn international paths of corrupt dealings could show the way. Could we start with Ta Ann cronyism and work our way back until we find a clean slate?
Then prosecute the lot, seize ill gotten assets and impose penalties commensurate with the disgust people feel about the chronic shonks. Jail them. Their physical wealth can follow their moral wealth.

Posted by russell on 20/11/12 at 12:36 PM

At last I see Jacki Schirmer has responded to Dr Richard Denniss, but not before Martin Luther McKim made a fool of himself by spraying it around. He was not the only one, Hobart’s Mercury newspaper got sucked in as well.
It really was a pathetic piece of sophistry.
Now I notice Denniss and his buddy McIntosh have combined to do another dump…. Will McKim be sucked in again, or will he realize everytime he opens his mouth he makes a fool of himself?

Posted by George Harris aka Woodworker on 20/11/12 at 07:57 PM

Come on! What’s wrong with you? Too embarrassed to respond?

Posted by George Harris aka Woodworker on 21/11/12 at 09:21 AM

I don’t see why woodie didn’t add all estimated toilet paper users to “wood product manufacturing”, which would take in a lot of people who don’t use any FT products.

Having long claimed that intensive woodchip logging is greenhouse positive, and that Tas has more forest now than at first settlement, why does he bother with even a pretence of veracity?

John Hayward

Posted by john hayward on 21/11/12 at 05:06 PM

It has me tossed as to how anybody could still be supportive to the body and black-heart of Forestry Tasmania, George?
If Forestry Tasmania had a mother at any time in its life, this mother would have hurled the body into a deep dark chasm, that way she would be sure that it would never snatch all the loot from her purse ever again.
From what I have been able to comprehend, only those listed on their ‘pecuniary benefits recipients list’ are their lone supporters.

That being so I can only wonder why you play the part of the white knight (without any expensive protective armour,) yet still remain their warrior bold, poised to defend the indefensible among the whole shebangello of Forestry Tasmania.

From the executive-level individuals, down through to the management incumbents, they surely must be party to all their GBEs volatile Commercial in Confidence undertakings, including their land and or property acquisitions, their lack-lustre marketing strategies then of the actual titled ownership of land as is claimed by the hierarchy of this shonky donkey GBE operation?

I have no qualms with the coal-face employed persons who are paid to perform their work in honest fashion, my qualms are aimed at those privileged individuals on the top deck of this Pirate Ship.
Do you know if Forestry Tasmania’s bean-counters have fed any money into the employees super-fund account on behalf of their employees, yet George, or is this matter still a nasty foreboding Gorilla in their midst?

Perhaps George you may know how this band of merry men who claim ownership to the forest activities and then to these very forests as their own, can continue to escape from all the many illegal engagements and of the allegations of impropriety known to have accrued during say the past 10 years or so?
Maybe the State’s Auditor General could show a little more interest in the affairs of this ongoing profitless State Funded Boys Club?

Still they are quite fortunate to have you as their lone volunteer when they are repeatedly smeared across the newspaper media headlines for their numerous nefarious dealings.

Posted by William Boeder on 28/11/12 at 12:40 PM

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